A Real-Life Former Slumdog Speaks

“People keep praising the film’s ‘realistic’ depiction of slum life in India. But it’s no such thing… Most people in the slums never achieve a fairy-tale ending. […] [M]ost slum dwellers never escape. Neither do their kids. No one wants to watch a movie about that.” Suzip Mazumdar recalls what life was like in the Indian ghetto.

Christopher Nolan, Prize-Winning Author And Quadriplegic, Dead At 43

“Unable to talk, walk or use his hands, he was confined to a wheelchair – but his intellect was unimpaired. He wrote by using a special keyboard; to help him type, his mother often held his head in her cupped hands while he painstakingly picked out each word, letter by letter, with the aid of a rod, or ‘unicorn stick’, attached to a headband which allowed him slowly to tap out words on a typewriter.”

Theatre Founder Files Suit Against Los Angeles County

Los Angeles Shakespeare Company founder Geoffrey Forward went public Friday with an announcement that he has filed an $11.9-million negligence and inverse condemnation claim against Los Angeles County, claiming that 80 “outrageous acts” on the part of various county departments over the course of several years caused construction delays that led to the foreclosure sale of the company theater, the Globe, in Topanga.

James Kudelka: Time To Start Thinking About Work Again

“After bolting from the National Ballet in 2005 (unhappy at the ramifications that came with the new Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts) and pulling up the drawbridge (this past summer he opened a bakery in Vittoria, Ont., population 600), Kudelka re-emerged to find himself not exactly at the top of the call list any more. ‘I woke up a year ago and thought, ‘Okay, I’ve got to start thinking about work’.”